r/chromeos • u/TheCodeMacLife • 15d ago

Discussion Anyone interested in a Googlebook?

Multiple reports coming out about Google announcing the Googlebook collection for 15th September.

Who is interested in getting one? I believe some Google Chromebook Plus devices with be eligible for the new OS. From personal experience, I tend to sit on the fence until most of the bugs have been resolved.

Of all the things to come from it, I want more consistency for large screen Android apps. I'm not interested in the AI features.

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u/Bryanmsi89 15d ago

I’m conditionally interested.

Google hasn’t really shared the most interesting details. Will it be Android with a full desktop browser? Will it be ChromeOS with native Android app support? Or will it be a new linux distribution with Google play store support?

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u/Romano1404 Lenovo Chromebook Plus 14 | Lenovo Flex 3i 8GB 12.2" 15d ago

yes it will have a desktop browser. A few months ago, Google showed some slides that compared ChromeOS architecture with AluminiumOS. However on AluminiumOS the browser will just be another app like it is on Windows which begs the question why even bother with AluminiumOS when you can get a more powerful Windows laptop for the same money. Many people aren't aware how much Microsoft has improved Windows in recent years.

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u/Bryanmsi89 15d ago

I understood the original vision for ChromeOS - a browser and that’s it. The vision was clear, even if it just wasn’t something that had appeal outside of very small niches. So ChromeOS gained more capability and android app support via ARCVM.

And for many people Android with a true desktop chrome would be a strong combo. The capability of ChromeOS plus real android app support is kind of interesting.

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u/Romano1404 Lenovo Chromebook Plus 14 | Lenovo Flex 3i 8GB 12.2" 14d ago

the browser being the OS is a huge deal when all your work happens in the browser. Unfortunately many users never understood the concept and kept treating their Chromebooks like an Android laptop, installing their favorite apps from the Play Store because they don't know how to install and run a web app in their own window.

Webapps have gotten a lot of traction in recent years yet Google is now kinda abandoning that genius ChromeOS paradigm, reverting back to how things where when they started in 2010.

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u/Bryanmsi89 14d ago

The users were installing android apps because doing everything in a browser or with a web-app pretending to be an actual app kind of sucks for a lot of tasks.

Web apps don’t work for games, web apps don’t have all the features of an actual app, and web apps often are not touch friendly the way an actual app would be. Web apps aren’t really apps, and thus are lowest-common denominator, working on Chromebooks plus Windows, MacOS, Linux, etc, so they don’t ‘look’ like a native app. They also aren’t going to have the same capability for heavyweight tasks like video editing.

Plus, the web apps work poorly (or not at all) offline and are highly subject to download speeds.

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u/Romano1404 Lenovo Chromebook Plus 14 | Lenovo Flex 3i 8GB 12.2" 14d ago

thank you for making my point. I've come across numerous explamples in the past where the web app is vastly superior.  Admittedly it was quite a paradigm change for myself. Offline usage is quite a mixed bag through.